


A Clean Ending

by PrettyLittleMonster



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: F/M, I'm projecting again, M/M, Please be safe reading this, fairly graphic depiction of a suicide attempt, tw for suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-22
Updated: 2019-01-22
Packaged: 2019-10-14 08:39:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 894
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17505284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PrettyLittleMonster/pseuds/PrettyLittleMonster
Summary: The house is clean. The house is clean and the house is silent and Kravitz needs to find Taako, because something is very wrong.I'm bad a summaries and titles, I'm sorry.





	A Clean Ending

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Not today...](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17374766) by [TickingClockwork](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TickingClockwork/pseuds/TickingClockwork). 



> This was inspired by the fic Not Today, by TickingClockwork, which you should deffo go read. I read it and I got emotional and I wrote this.

_“Go to him, my child, and do what you must…”_

The words rang, piercing through Kravitz’s mind as he knocked on Taako’s door. He hadn’t the faintest idea what his Queen could have meant, but both she and Lady Istus had insisted. And both had told him to _“Make things right, whatever it takes.”_ Neither would say more.

“Taako?” He called, knocking once again, but there was no answer; the house was still. So Kravitz opened the door.

The moment he stepped inside, he was filled with a sickening dread that nearly made him physically ill. Taako’s cloak was hung carefully on the hook beside the door and everything in the sitting room was in perfect place, as if the whole room had been obsessively cleaned and straightened several times over. A few more steps inside revealed that it wasn’t only the front room—the entire house seemed immaculate, and Taako was nowhere to be found. Kravitz called out to him several times, but there was no answer, and he was beginning to think he’d have to go looking for him until a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach pointed him toward the closed bathroom door.

He knocked. No answer. He tried the doorknob and it was locked.

“Babe? I’m uh, I’m worried about you.”

No answer.

“The Raven Queen and Lady Istus sent me, I think they’re worried too.”

No answer.

“Taako, I’m… I’m coming in, okay?”

It wasn’t difficult to get the door unlocked; the hard part was opening the door, because something was telling him Taako was in there, and Kravitz thought he was prepared for the worst.

He wasn’t.

He pushed the door open and nearly collapsed to the ground. He was so… empty. Taako was laid, curled up on his side in the bathtub, his eyes foggy and staring lifelessly ahead. His skin was so pale it was nearly translucent, exposing veins and capillaries underneath and gods above how was there so much blood? There were no wounds, no cuts, just blood, still fresh, dripping from his nose and mouth. It was almost as if there had been a struggle confined to this one spot, like he’d coughed it up, been in pain, before falling unconscious, and when Kravitz managed to take a shaking step forward, he saw why.

Taako was clutching a bottle of poison in cold, stiff hands. No. No, he didn’t do this, he wouldn’t. He wouldn’t leave his boyfriend and his sister and his family like that—except he did, because there was a note scrawled in lipstick on the mirror.

_“I’m sorry.”_

Everything seemed to fall into place at once, and Kravitz almost threw up. Everything was left so clean, so perfect for whoever had to clean up after, he even went as far as to die in the bathtub so the blood would be easier to clean up, and that meant he knew there would be blood, he’d done his _research_ on the poison, known how painful it was going to be to choke up all that blood and just lie there and wait to die.

It left Kravitz frozen, standing in shock in the bathroom for… a long time, he couldn’t remember, until suddenly there was screaming.

_Lup._

She was collapsed in a pile in the doorway, sobbing and screaming for her brother, begging Kravitz to do something, do anything, save him, fix this, and Barry was trying to hold her back, but she shook him off and threw herself at her brother’s… body. The sudden noise shook Kravitz from his daze and he took in what was happening around him—Barry slumped against the doorframe, looking very much like he was going to be sick, Lup covered in Taako’s blood, curled around his limp frame as if she needed to protect him.

“Kravitz,” she practically growled. “You have to fix this, you can’t take him away from me, you’ve gotta bring him back, please Kravitz, I don’t care what the Raven Queen says-“

That’s right. His Queen had told him to do what he must, and gods damn him, he was going to bring him back. He took a step toward the tub and Lup instinctively guarded her twin.

“It’s okay,” he said calmly, though he felt anything but calm. “I’m going to bring him back, Lup. We won’t lose him.” She nodded and gave him room to work, but stayed tucked close to the dead elf. Kravitz didn’t blame her. He grounded himself as much as possible considering the circumstances, and summoned a small velvet pouch containing a fine powder he’d never had to use before. Using the powder as a medium, he sketched several small runes across the bathroom floor, and when he was sure they were perfect, he finished with one across Taako’s forehead.

A ball of golden light began to form above the body, one Kravitz knew well. It was his lover’s soul, which materialized for a moment and then sank into Taako’s chest, and for a moment, there was silence. No. This had to work, he’d done everything right, he couldn’t be gone, this was-

The elf coughed and opened his eyes slowly. Everyone was quiet as he took in his surroundings; he looked at Lup, then at Kravitz, then sank back down to the blood-soaked tub floor and muttered,

“Gods fucking damn it.”

**Author's Note:**

> Come yell at me on tumblr @propertyoflup


End file.
